The Essay

Five writers and artists not normally associated with classical music, discuss a specific example of Vaughan Williams’ work to which they have a personal connection, and why it speaks to them.Following on from the successful Five Kinds of Beethoven Radio 3 essay series in 2020, where a wide range of Beethoven fans shared their personal relationship to the composer and his work, this new series gives similar treatment to Vaughan Williams. Our essayists share their unexpected perspective on Vaughan Williams’ work, taking it outside the standard ‘English pastoral’ box, in a series of accessible essays, part of the Vaughan Williams season on Radio 3. Luke Turner – nature writer and music journalist The Wasps – Aristophanic Suite was an EMI and John Player Special cassette tape that Luke’s family listened to on long car journeys in the 1980s. Obviously the cassette opens with The Lark Ascending, but like a pop smash hit drawing your attention to an album, that piece was merely the introduction to The Wasps - Aristophanic Suite on the second side, played by the London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Vernon Handley. It became the soundtrack to Luke’s growing awareness of the English landscape as it passed by the windows, not in a simple, bucolic way, but the complexities of the place, the baked bean orange of traffic lights on the M62 over the Yorkshire Moors, the strange Cold War military installations that seemed to be everywhere, motorway reservations and the endless traffic jams around the Kings Lynn Roundabout. The piece also captures for Luke an awareness of how music works, how it combines with emotion and experience to become integral to memory, how something called The Wasps could have next to nothing to do with the insects, how his young mind could place onto this music whatever his imagination brought forward. It feels like many of his generation and certainly in his profession as a music journalist see Vaughan Williams as quite an establishment figure or quite conservative, but The Wasps was psychedelic music that made inroads into Luke’s imagination, and unleashed the possibilities of sound connecting to place. Luke Turner is a writer and editor. He co-founded the influential music website The Quietus where he runs a regular podcast and radio show. He has contributed to the Guardian, Dazed & Confused, Vice, NME, Q, Mojo, Monocle, Nowness and Somesuch Stories, among other publications. His first book, Out of the Woods, was shortlisted for the Wainwright Prize. Born in Bradford, he lives in London.Writer and reader Luke Turner Sound designer Paul Cargill Producers Polly Thomas and Yusra Warsama Exec producer Eloise WhitmoreA Naked Production for BBC Radio 3

Five writers and artists not normally associated with classical music, discuss a specific example of Vaughan Williams’s work to which they have a personal connection, and why it speaks to them.Following on from the successful Five Kinds of Beethoven Radio 3 essay series in 2020, where a wide range of Beethoven fans shared their personal relationship to the composer and his work, this new series gives similar treatment to Vaughan Williams. Our essayists share their unexpected perspective on Vaughan Williams’s work, taking it outside the standard ‘English pastoral’ box, in a series of accessible essays, part of the Vaughan Williams season on Radio 3. Essay 3: Adrian McNally - producer/arranger/pianist for The Unthanks Self-taught and raised in a South Yorkshire pit village, Adrian McNally is pianist, composer and band leader for The Unthanks. From humble beginnings to scoring for his band to perform with Charles Hazelwood's Army of Generals, Brighouse and Rastrick Brass Band and the BBC Concert Orchestra for The Proms, McNally has sought confidence and inspiration along the way from Ralph Vaughan Williams. He finds kinship in a quest to prove that the people's music is anything but common, to draw out and elevate the beauty and truth present in those folk songs fondly but unfairly known as low culture. In his essay, McNally looks at VW's thoughts on National Music and the inescapable relationship between place, community and creativity. At the centre of his essay will be Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis. It was born out of a tune Vaughan Williams was preoccupied with - a love letter to something that already existed, that inspired him to make something more. Self-taught and raised in a South Yorkshire pit village, Adrian McNally is pianist, composer, record producer and band leader for The Unthanks. From humble beginnings to scoring for performances with Charles Hazelwood's Army Of Generals, the Royal Liverpool Phil, Brighouse and Rastrick Brass Band and the BBC Concert Orchestra for The Proms.Writer and reader Adrian McNally Sound designer Paul Cargill Producers Polly Thomas and Yusra Warsama Exec producer Eloise WhitmorePhotographic Image by Sarah MasonA Naked Production for BBC Radio 3

Five writers and artists not normally associated with classical music, discuss a specific example of Vaughan Williams’s work to which they have a personal connection, and why it speaks to them.Following on from the successful Five Kinds of Beethoven Radio 3 essay series in 2020, where a wide range of Beethoven fans shared their personal relationship to the composer and his work, this new series gives similar treatment to Vaughan Williams. Our essayists share their unexpected perspective on Vaughan Williams’s work, taking it outside the standard ‘English pastoral’ box, in a series of accessible essays, part of the Vaughan Williams season on Radio 3. The Lark Ascending is Dr Rommi Smith’s favourite piece by Vaughan Williams. It has accompanied her all over the world in her travels as a poet and teacher, reminding her of her Englishness and her home, even when as a Black woman, she is often not ‘seen’ as being English. The piece is a key part of her English DNA. This was brought home to her vividly when the violinist Tai Murray, a Black American woman, played the piece during the Proms in 2018. There was subsequent racist twitter comment, saying she had only been ‘let in’ because she is Black. Dr Rommi Smith considers her own connection to The Lark Ascending and how who performs it is significant.Dr Rommi Smith is an award-winning poet, playwright, theatre-maker, performer and librettist. A three-time BBC Writer-in-residence, she is the inaugural British Parliamentary Writer-in-Residence and inaugural 21st century Poet-in-Residence for Keats’ House, Hampstead. A Visiting Scholar at City University New York (CUNY), she has presented her research and writing at institutions including: THE SEGAL THEATRE, THE SCHOMBURG CENTER FOR RESEARCH IN BLACK CULTURE and CITY COLLEGE NEW YORK. Rommi’s performance at THE SCHWERNER WRITERS’ SERIES in New York was at the invitation of Tyehimba Jess, Pulitzer Prize winner for Poetry. Rommi is a Doctor of Philosophy in English and Theatre. Her academic writing was first published by NEW YORK UNIVERSITY PRESS as part of the groundbreaking book IMAGINING QUEER METHODS (2019). Her poetry is included in publications ranging from OUT OF BOUNDS (Bloodaxe) to MORE FIYA (Canongate). She is recipient of a HEDGEBROOK Fellowship (Cottage: Waterfall, 2014) and is a winner of THE NORTHERN WRITERS’ PRIZE for Poetry 2019 (chosen by the poet Don Paterson). She was recently awarded a prestigious CAVE CANEM fellowship in the US. Rommi was selected a SPHINX30 playwright; a prestigious programme of professional mentoring for – and by - contemporary women playwrights, led by legendary company, SPHINX THEATRE. Rommi is a contributor to BBC radio programmes including: FRONT ROW, THE VERB and the radio documentary INVISIBLE MAN: PARABLE FOR OUR TIMES?, marking 70 years since the publication of Ralph Ellison’s iconic novel. Rommi is poet-in-residence for the WORDSWORTH TRUST, Grasmere. www.rommi-smith.co.uk Twitter: @rommismith Soundcloud: RommiSmith Instagram: Rommi SmithWriter and reader Rommi Smith Sound designer Paul Cargill Producers Polly Thomas and Yusra Warsama Exec producer Eloise WhitmorePhotographic Image by Lizzie CoombesA Naked Production for BBC Radio 3

Five writers and artists not normally associated with classical music, discuss a specific example of Vaughan Williams’s work to which they have a personal connection, and why it speaks to them.Following on from the successful Five Kinds of Beethoven Radio 3 essay series in 2020, where a wide range of Beethoven fans shared their personal relationship to the composer and his work, this new series gives similar treatment to Vaughan Williams. Our essayists share their unexpected perspective on Vaughan Williams’s work, taking it outside the standard ‘English pastoral’ box, in a series of accessible essays, part of the Vaughan Williams season on Radio 3. Essay 1: Clare Shaw – poet/dramatistClare considers the role that Vaughan Williams’ setting to music of the Welsh hymn Rhosymedre has played in their life. They first played it as a teenager on the viola, for the Burnley Youth Orchestra. It symbolised an expression of beauty, love and hope, a sense of voice and connection to place and possibility... It is also that rare moment in music where the viola gets to carry the melody. Then, in Clare’s fifties, when their mother (a cellist) died, the piece became a conduit for overwhelming grief, a way of holding the horrific and sublime experience of being present at the moment of death. Clare came home after their mother had died and played Rhosymedre, then wrote this poem about her and the music.Clare Shaw is a poet and performer, tutor and trainer. They have four poetry collections from Bloodaxe: Straight Ahead (2006), Head On (2012), Flood (2018) and Towards a General Theory of Love (2022). Clare is a regular tutor with a range of literary organisations - including the Poetry School, the Wordsworth Trust and the Arvon Foundation - delivering creative writing courses, workshops and mentoring sessions in a variety of different settings, with individuals at all levels of ability, confidence and experience. They work with the Royal Literary Fund and the Writing Project, supporting the development of writing skills in academic settings and workplaces. Clare is the co-director of the Kendal Poetry Festival - and involved in a range of innovative projects with artists and practitioners in other disciplines, including psychology, visual arts and music. Clare is also a mental health educator. All their work is underpinned by a deep faith in language: words have the power to harm and help us, and powerful language can transform us as individuals, communities and societies.Writer and reader Clare Shaw Sound designer Paul Cargill Producers Polly Thomas and Yusra Warsama Exec producer Eloise WhitmoreA Naked Production for BBC Radio 3

Poet, editor and writer Alvin Pang loves Singapore. It’s just that he doesn’t necessarily want to be in Singapore. He loves it, but the cause for this is a wanderlust and a need for movement which has given him an instinct to push down walls. He explores how the Singapore mindset of the convivial host can set a writer in good stead for a creative life. Presented by Alvin Pang Produced by Kevin Core

Anil Pradhan says he is defined by his “inbetween-ness”. As a gay, Indian, Nepali poet he considers the strange duality - that while English may be linked with the colonial mindset that defined India – it is also a language that allows him to express his true self. This episode was recorded at the BBC Contains Strong Language Festival in Birmingham.Presented by Anil Pradhan Produced by Kevin Core

Isabelle Baafi has a unique take on healthcare, forged by the Caribbean origins of a succession of female healers in her family. Reaching back in time from her own childhood visit to A&E, Isabelle explores her mother’s adage – that to heal someone is to change their destiny. Presented by Isabelle Baafi Produced by Kevin Core

Roy McFarlane, former Birmingham Laureate, recalls the mask worn by his Jamaican late father – a mask designed to help him integrate into his new UK home. But did it work? Roy recalls the dignity of a man who worked hard to put money on the table – and encyclopaedias on the shelves. His essay was recorded at the BBC's Contains Strong Language Festival in Birmingham.This essay contains strong racist language which some may find offensive.Presented by Roy McFarlane Produced by Kevin Core

The Indian writer and dancer Tishani Doshi considers the impact of her mother’s upbringing thousands of miles away in the UK and how her imagination returns to the exotic idea - of a row of small terraced houses in the seemingly endless summer nights of Wales. Her essay was recorded at the BBC's Contains Strong Language Festival in Birmingham. Presented by Tishani Doshi Produced by Kevin Core

Poet and writer Casey Bailey is returning to Birmingham after a holiday and reliving memories of his childhood in Nechells. Casey is the Birmingham Poet Laureate 2020-2022. He’s a writer, performer and educator born and raised in Nechells, Birmingham. Casey has performed nationally and internationally, spent time on a residency with the Royal Shakespeare Company. His debut poetry pamphlet ‘Waiting at Bloomsbury Park’ was published in 2017. His first full collection of poetry ‘Adjusted’ in 2018 was followed by his second collection Please Do Not Touch in 2021.Producers: Rosie Boulton and Melvin Rickarby A Must Try Softer Production A co-commission between BBC Radio 3 and the Space with funding from Arts Council England.

Poet Naush Sabah is re-visiting her childhood home in Sparkbrook, BirminghamNaush is a poet, writer, editor, critic and educator based in the West Midlands. In 2019, she co-founded the Poetry Birmingham Literary Journal where she is currently Editor and Publishing Director. Naush also co-founded Pallina Press where she is Editor-at-Large and she currently serves as a trustee at Poetry London. Her writing has appeared in The Poetry Review, the TLS, PN Review, The Dark Horse, Modern Poetry in Translation, and elsewhere. She was shortlisted for the Royal Society of Literature’s 2021 Sky Arts Writers Award. Her debut pamphlet Litanies was published by Guillemot Press in November 2021. She's a visiting lecturer in creative writing at Birmingham City University. Producers: Rosie Boulton and Melvin Rickarby A Must Try Softer Production A co-commission between BBC Radio 3 and the Space with funding from Arts Council England.

Writer Professor Thomas Glave has been in London and is returning on a train at night to his home city of Birmingham.Thomas was born in the Bronx and grew up there and in Kingston, Jamaica. His work has earned many honours, including the Lambda Literary Award in 2005 and 2008, an O. Henry Prize, a Fine Arts Center in Provincetown Fellowship, and a Fulbright fellowship to Jamaica. He's the author of Whose Song? and Other Stories, Words to Our Now: Imagination and Dissent, The Torturer's Wife, and Among the Bloodpeople: Politics and Flesh. Thomas has been Martin Luther King Jr. Visiting Professor at MIT, a Leverhulme Visiting Professor at the University of Warwick, a Visiting Fellow at Clare Hall, Cambridge and writer-in-residence at the University of Liverpool. He lives in the Jewellery Quarter in Birmingham. Producers: Rosie Boulton and Melvin Rickarby A Must Try Softer Production A co-commission between BBC Radio 3 and the Space with funding from Arts Council England.

Writer Dr Shahed Yousaf is driving home to Birmingham from a very demanding day at work in prison.Shahed is a GP who works in prisons, substance misuse centres and with the homeless community. He has just published a memoir: Stitched Up. He spends his time running between emergencies - from overdoses to assaults, from cell fires to suicides - with one hand always hovering over the panic button. He was shortlisted for the Bath Flash Fiction Prize 2016 and commended for the Faber & Faber FAB Prize 2017. Shahed won a place on to the Writing West Midlands Room 204 Mentoring scheme and the Middle Way Mentoring Project in 2019.Producers: Rosie Boulton and Melvin Rickarby A Must Try Softer Production A co-commission between BBC Radio 3 and the Space with funding from Arts Council England.

Writer Helen Cross is remembering how clubbing in 90s Birmingham and an encounter with an oil painting in Birmingham's Museum and Art Gallery led her to feel at home in this city.Helen is the author of novels, stories, radio plays and screenplays. Her first novel, My Summer of Love, won a Betty Trask Award and became a BAFTA award-winning feature film. Her recent work includes a BBC Afternoon Play The Return of Rowena The Wonderful and a five-part audio drama series: English Rose. Helen teaches creative writing at various international venues, at UK universities and on many online and community courses. Helen lives in Kings Heath, Birmingham.Producers: Rosie Boulton and Melvin Rickarby A Must Try Softer Production A co-commission between BBC Radio 3 and the Space with funding from Arts Council England.

For the final essay in the series, architectural designer Christopher Laing gives a personal account of how he started Signstrokes, which introduces standardised sign language for architecture. Deaf people are not new to architecture, however they face significant barriers because the sign language vocabulary of the profession is not standardised and lacks terms to express architectural concepts uncommon in everyday language.Christopher, drawing upon his own difficult experience at university, where he suffered the consequence of few deaf people before him studying architecture anywhere. The knock-on effect was that very few British Sign Language interpreters knew architectural terms or context, having never worked in the field before. Christopher had to take on the additional responsibility, on top of his degree, of helping the university interpreters familiarise themselves with the jargon and signs to use when interpreting the lectures.Christopher collaborated with Adolfs Kristapsons to create the corpus dictionary of architect signs that everyone could use. Christopher shares with us the long, laborious process of creating new signs. Christopher asserts that not only are these signs useful for the deaf community - but actually seeing what words mean, helps everyone understand each other. Christopher hopes that Signstrokes will inspire other deaf professionals to persevere with their chosen dreams; and show how it is possible to get creative with jargon. Christopher maintains that ultimately we all want to understand the world we live in, and each other, and language shouldn’t be a barrier to that. A Flashing Lights Media production for BBC Radio 3.

Dr Robert Adam is an assistant professor at Heriot-Watt University and a lecturer in Linguistics, British Sign Language and Deaf Studies.In the course of his essay, Robert asks, who are the arbiters of British Sign Language? How can its evolution be managed?Robert shares how fewer deaf children are learning British Sign Language at school, and more are now learning it later in life, as young adults. From an outsider’s perspective this may seem relatively harmless, but this language deprivation and dispersal of deaf people from each other, means that deaf children do not get the chance to develop extensive peer groups, or learn to sign from a fluent or native signer. Robert goes on to explore the colonial history of British Sign Language and how there is no single country that ‘owns’ the one language, and British Sign Language is certainly not owned solely by the British Deaf community. He talks wryly of the irony of deaf people in the UK continuing to struggle with equal access to information and participation in broader society and yet BSL is a colonising language.Robert talks frankly of how on various platforms we are now witnessing astonishing bastardisations of sign language, to the point that a BSL Watchdog has recently been established by a group of concerned deaf people. There are also concerns about sign language gradually being eroded as new generations of deaf children are denied access to it through what Robert sees as misguided attempts at so-called “inclusion” in education. Will so-called, ‘proper sign language’ become a thing of the past? A Flashing Lights Media production for BBC Radio 3.

Deepa Shastri, an actress, sign song performer and British Sign Language consultant. Deepa explores how Deaf culture and sign language being represented in the arts is so important to the deaf community but also how the arts and sign language naturally go hand in hand - due to the visual and expressive nature of sign language. Back in the 80s, when Marlee Matlin became the first deaf Oscar winner for her performance in 'Children of a Lesser God', things were about to become very exciting for the deaf arts. Fast forward a few decades, Deepa shares how we are now entering a new era where deaf people are being represented on screen and on stage with the likes of Rose Ayling-Ellis picking up the Glitterball, Sophie Stone appearing in Dr. Who and Nadeem Islam making waves on series such as ITV's 'The Bay'. Theatre companies such as Deafinitely Theatre were and continue to be the breeding ground of deaf talent. Within the context of exploring Deafinitely Theatre's work, Deepa explores the complex process of translating Shakespeare plays to British Sign Language and how BSL has its limitations; we do not have signs for every word that exists in the English Dictionary which makes translation difficult. Still, the positives outweigh the limitations. Sign language is very poetic which bodes well for Shakespeare plays in sign language. Deepa concludes that she believes we're entering the golden age for deaf performers as sign language and deaf performers are appearing on all platforms to show the beauty of sign language and how it elevate a performance or a production. A Flashing Lights Media production for BBC Radio 3.

Tina Kelberman shares her experience of growing up in a large deaf Jewish family. Her family has inherited deafness for six generations now and are probably also the biggest Deaf Jewish family in the UK. Whilst their culture is steeped in history, spanning back almost two centuries, it's been a rocky road for them - as Tina shares. She hated the feeling of people watching her family communicate in sign language. Her parents also hated it and so did her grandparents- to the point where their signs were smaller and more secretive when out in public. 70 years on, not much has changed. But Tina talks of how we are bolder these days, and how her own children stare right back until the people staring look away.Tina talks candidly about how sign language is like any other language and so it evolves. Tina gives us examples of the evolution such as the telephone - how signs evolved from the candlestick phone to the mobile phone as we know it today. Tina used to correct her mother’s signing, just like all kids groan at their parents' seemingly outdated or uncool words.With her children being two of the last deaf, Jewish people from a large deaf family, she worries about what the future holds for them. Tina admits that her children don’t know the Jewish signs for Hanukkah and Passover, or understand why these words are signed as they are. She wonders if it is maybe it is time for her to take them to the Jewish Deaf Association to remind them of their heritage and to use signs that have been passed on to them. A Flashing Lights Media production for BBC Radio 3.

Dr Robert Adam is an assistant professor at Heriot-Watt University and a lecturer in Linguistics, British Sign Language and Deaf Studies.In his essay, 'Sign Language through the Ages', Robert explores the rich and layered history of British Sign Language. He recalls the first time he read a piece of deaf history - his father’s school published ‘Utmost for the Highest’ for its centenary in 1962, and was full of black and white photos of stern looking people and impressive edifices. The faces and names of long-dead deaf people leapt out at Robert and made him wonder what was life like for those deaf people then? They achieved so much but would have had to find their way in times where there were no anti-discrimination laws. Robert shares with us how Deaf people and sign languages have existed since antiquity. Quintus Pedius, a painter in the first century AD, is the first recorded deaf person in history. The first clear record of sign language being used was a wedding in Leicester in 1575. So why is sign language still viewed as a 'new' language by some? Robert shares the story of the fated Milan Congress held in September 1880 which was attended by mostly hearing educators from around the world who resolved to stop the use of sign language in the classroom. After Milan, sign language went 'underground' till the 20th century where it began to gain traction again - largely due to programmes such as 'Vision On' and 'See Hear' which graced our screens. Within the context of the historical discourse, Robert concludes that deaf people are pioneers in their field and their work has had an impact on our lives today. A Flashing Lights Media production for BBC Radio 3.

In 1945, when World WarII finally ended and while Europe's artistic centres smouldered, in New York City an artistic renaissance, in music, painting, theatre, and literature, burst forth out of the city’s bohemia.Most of this work was generated in a single neighbourhood of Manhattan: Greenwich Village. World War II in America was a time of national unity, a singleness of purpose where non-conformity had no place in military or civilian life. Yet somehow as soon as the war ended, a full-blown non-conformist bohemia exploded in New York. Membership of this Bohemia, for men at least, was signified by wearing an undergarment - the T-shirt - in public. Today that means nothing. In 1945, in a society that was still mobilized with military single-mindedness, it was shocking.In this series for The Essay, Michael Goldfarb explores the how and why of this extraordinary eruption through the stories of some of T-shirt Bohemia's key figures: Marlon Brando, Jackson Pollock, James Baldwin, Charlie Parker and Jack Kerouac.In this episode, the influence of Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg, two T-shirt wearing Columbia University students, and the events that propelled them towards the writing that would become known as Beat.

In 1945, when World War II finally ended and while Europe's artistic centres smouldered, in New York City an artistic renaissance, in music, painting, theatre, and literature, burst forth out of the city’s bohemia.Most of this work was generated in a single neighbourhood of Manhattan: Greenwich Village. World War II in America was a time of national unity, a singleness of purpose where non-conformity had no place in military or civilian life. Yet somehow as soon as the war ended, a full-blown non-conformist bohemia exploded in New York. Membership of this Bohemia, for men at least, was signified by wearing an undergarment - the T-shirt - in public. Today that means nothing. In 1945, in a society that was still mobilised with military single-mindedness, it was shocking.In this series for The Essay, Michael Goldfarb explores the how and why of this extraordinary eruption through the stories of some of T-shirt Bohemia's key figures: Marlon Brando, Jackson Pollock, James Baldwin, Charlie Parker and Jack Kerouac.In this episode, the importance of Charlie Parker and Miles Davis and how the war created the space for jazz to evolve into America's unique form of classical music.

In 1945, when World War II finally ended and while Europe's artistic centres smouldered, in New York City an artistic renaissance, in music, painting, theatre, and literature, burst forth out of the city’s bohemia.Most of this work was generated in a single neighbourhood of Manhattan: Greenwich Village. World War II in America was a time of national unity, a singleness of purpose where non-conformity had no place in military or civilian life. Yet somehow as soon as the war ended, a full-blown non-conformist bohemia exploded in New York. Membership of this Bohemia, for men at least, was signified by wearing an undergarment - the T-shirt - in public. Today that means nothing. In 1945, in a society that was still mobilised with military single-mindedness, it was shocking.In this series for The Essay, Michael Goldfarb explores the how and why of this extraordinary eruption through the stories of some of T-shirt Bohemia's key figures: Marlon Brando, Jackson Pollock, James Baldwin, Charlie Parker and Jack Kerouac.In this episode, the story of Jackson Pollock, a keen T-shirt wearer, as he struggles towards his abstract vision and the role of Pollock's wife, Lee Krasner, an artist in her own right, in his success.

In 1945, when World War II finally ended and while Europe's artistic centres smouldered, in New York City an artistic renaissance, in music, painting, theatre, and literature, burst forth out of the city’s bohemia.Most of this work was generated in a single neighbourhood of Manhattan: Greenwich Village. World War II in America was a time of national unity, a singleness of purpose where non-conformity had no place in military or civilian life. Yet somehow as soon as the war ended, a full-blown non-conformist bohemia exploded in New York. Membership of this Bohemia, for men at least, was signified by wearing an undergarment - the T-shirt - in public. Today that means nothing. In 1945, in a society that was still mobilised with military single-mindedness, it was shocking.In this series for The Essay, Michael Goldfarb explores the how and why of this extraordinary eruption through the stories of some of T-shirt Bohemia's key figures: Marlon Brando, Jackson Pollock, James Baldwin, Charlie Parker and Jack Kerouac.In this episode, Michael focuses on James Baldwin, Marlon Brando's wartime roommate in Greenwich Village, and the slow integration of American letters by African American authors.

In 1945, when World War II finally ended and while Europe's artistic centres smouldered, in New York City an artistic renaissance, in music, painting, theatre, and literature, burst forth out of the city’s bohemian.Most of this work was generated in a single neighbourhood of Manhattan: Greenwich Village. World War II in America was a time of national unity, a singleness of purpose where non-conformity had no place in military or civilian life. Yet somehow as soon as the war ended, a full-blown non-conformist bohemia exploded in New York. Membership of this Bohemia, for men at least, was signified by wearing an undergarment - the T-shirt - in public. Today that means nothing. In 1945, in a society that was still mobilised with military single-mindedness, it was shocking.In this series for The Essay, Michael Goldfarb explores the how and why of this extraordinary eruption through the stories of some of T-shirt Bohemia's key figures: Marlon Brando, Jackson Pollock, James Baldwin, Charlie Parker and Jack Kerouac.In this episode, he focuses on Marlon Brando and Stanley Kowalski whose T-shirts were designed by Lucinda Ballard, for the original production of A Streetcar Named Desire.

Joanna Robertson argues that it's the regular, everyday moments and rituals that make up and frame the fabric of our lives. The details of dress or speech that shape and project an identity. Painters capturing an essence in time, like that of Madame Cezanne in Provence, dressed in blue, hair pulled tautly back into a bun, sitting next to a table with a white cup and saucer, spoon standing upwards in the cup. Or the myriad details, from by-passers to snippets of conversations to the design of a chair or cafe interior, which, when well observed, can turn the instant of taking the first sip of a milky coffee in that same cafe to the level of a miracle, where all surroundings coalesce into one, soul-sweetening moment. Written and presented by Joanna Robertson Series Producer: Arlene Gregorius Series Editor: Penny Murphy Sound engineer: Nigel Appleton Production Coordinator: Janet Staples

Joanna Robertson believes it's the everyday moments that shape, frame and colour our lives. That includes observing, or imagining, the lives of others around us. Are portraitists creating a mere image, or capturing the authentic selves of their subjects? The celebrated Belle Epoque painter Giovanni Boldini became a darling of Parisian society with his glamorous portrayals of society women, but a spontaneous portrait of a wealthy couple's gardener in eastern France, possibly painted for Boldini's own eyes only, inside the lid of his paintbox, gloriously reveals the gardener's inner life.And what about the people we meet or see ourselves? Take the new neighbours who moved into a flat opposite. Their daily rituals, from their apparently perfect breakfast to their equally apparently perfect dinner, with all five regulation courses, every night, all seen through the windows. Why is observing them, with the resulting questioning of Joanna's own habits, such a vivid part of her and her daughters' daily life? And then Joanna actually meets the family. How do they compare to their imagined selves? Written and presented by Joanna Robertson Producer: Arlene Gregorius Editor: Penny Murphy Sound engineer: Nigel Appleton Production Coordinator: Janet Staples

'It's only the minutiae of life that are important,' wrote the Austro-Hungarian author Joseph Roth, announcing that he was 'going for a walk'. Joanna Robertson feels, and does, the same, and finds that far from small, the minutiae are actually infinite. Just walking from her Paris flat to a nearby bakery, yields so many observations, memories and encounters, that they conjure up the life of the whole street. From the homeless man sleeping, and dying, on the monastery's front steps, to the blazing row (and withering put-downs) of two usually tolerant ladies of Polish and Russian heritage respectively. Not to mention the rivalry between Joanna's dogs and those of a well-known model and designer, who every day claim each others' territory in ways only dogs will....Written and presented by Joanna Robertson Producer: Arlene Gregorius Editor: Penny Murphy Sound engineer: Nigel Appleton Production Coordinator: Janet Staples

The minutiae of the everyday frame, shape and colour our lives. Joanna Robertson lives in Paris, and finds that the views from her fourth-floor flat have a real influence on her daily life. Looking out over the neighbourhood of Montparnasse, her windows let her eye and mind wander over the sites of much recent and not so recent cultural history. Former residents whose residences she can still see, range from Irish playwright Samuel Beckett to Austro-Hungarian writer Joseph Roth. And, following in the footsteps of painter John Constable, Joanna too goes "skying", as he called it: observing the sky and its cloudscapes through the window. What's beyond the glass is both separate from, yet also inextricably part of her life. Written and presented by Joanna Robertson Producer: Arlene Gregorius Editor: Penny Murphy Sound engineer: Nigel Appleton Production Coordinator: Janet Staples

The minutiae of life have always fascinated Joanna Robertson. Moments like opening the curtains or shutters in the morning, putting the key in the lock when returning home, making dinner, or smelling the cooking of the neighbours. The author Virginia Woolf dismissed everyday repetitive rituals as 'moments of non-being', by contrast to epiphanies of experience or understanding that she saw as 'moments of being'. Joanna Robertson argues that on the contrary, the deceptively insignificant everyday is actually what our lives are made of. They shape, frame and colour our waking moments. Other writers, like Proust, or painters like Vermeer or van Hooch, appear to agree, and have captured the essence of the everyday in their art. Written and presented by Joanna Robertson Producer: Arlene Gregorius Editor: Penny Murphy Sound engineer: Nigel Appleton Production Coordinator: Janet Staples

Five writers go on five reflective, restorative and often playful journeys in search of the final resting places of their literary heroes.Concluding the series, Paterson Joseph retraces the footsteps of pioneering writer, composer and abolitionist Ignatius Sancho through Westminster to a lost grave beneath the still-pulsing streets.Producer: Ciaran Bermingham

Five writers go on five reflective, restorative and often playful journeys in search of the final resting places of their literary heroes.Today, Anita Sethi journeys to the grave of her heroine Anne Brontë, overlooking the sea she so loved, and considers why she was buried high on a hill in Scarborough, away from her better known sisters. Her grave has over the years been neglected and ravaged by the elements, but more recently - like her reputation - restored. Producer: Ciaran Bermingham

Five writers go on five reflective, restorative and often playful journeys in search of the final resting places of their literary heroes.Today, Diana Souhami steps into the tomb of Radclyffe Hall in London’s Highgate Cemetery, where The Well of Loneliness author resides with her lover, her lover’s husband and their dog Tulip – an aptly unconventional set-up in death as in life.Producer: Ciaran Bermingham

Five writers go on five reflective, restorative and often playful journeys in search of the final resting places of their literary heroes. Today Paul Muldoon recalls numerous pilgrimages to the rugged west coast of Ireland, where the remains of WB Yeats may or may not be buried, as per his poetical final request.Producer: Ciaran Bermingham

Five writers go on five reflective, restorative and often playful journeys in search of the final resting places of their literary heroes. Today Lauren Elkin finds Oscar Wilde in Pere Lachaise, Paris - where the outsider in life overshadows in death the greats of French literature who jostle for space in the famous cemetery. Producer: Ciaran Bermingham

From full stops to emojis, a Tudor letter to texting - how has the use of punctuation marks developed over the centuries? Florence Hazrat thinks about the way brackets help us understand the pandemic. The first parentheses appear in a 1399 manuscript by the Italian lawyer Coluccio Salutati, but - as her essay outlines - it took over 500 years for the sign born at the same time as the bracket, the exclamation mark (which printers rather aptly call “bang”) to find its true environment: the internet.Florence Hazrat is a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow, University of Sheffield. She is a 2021 New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to select ten academics each year to turn their research into radio.Producer: Robyn Read

Xangô (the god of thunder) and Paso Ñañigo’, composed by the Cuban Moises Simons, were two of the numbers performed by Elsie Houston in the clubs of Paris in the 1920s. Also able to sing soprano in Portuguese, English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, and Russian, Elsie's performances in Afro-Brazilian dialects chimed with the fashion for all things African. Adjoa Osei's essay traces Elsie's connections with Surrealist artists and writers, (there are photos of her taken by Man Ray), and looks at how she used her mixed race heritage to navigate her way through society and speak out for African-inspired arts. Adjoa Osei is a researcher based at Trinity College, Cambridge. She was selected as a 2021 New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to turn research into radio. You can hear her discussing the career of another singer Rita Montaner in this episode of Free Thinking https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0010q8b and taking part in this Free Thinking discussion From Blackface to Beyoncé https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000tnlt Producer: Ruth Watts

Africa's first filmmakers boldly revealed how, and why, colonialism lived on after the independences. Sarah Jilani takes a closer look at the works of Ousmane Sembène and Souleymane Cissé. The Malian director's 1982 film Finye (the Bambara word for wind) considers students as the winds of change, whilst Sembène's Mandabi, made in 1968, takes its title from a Wolof word deriving from the French for a postal money order – le mandat postale. Adapting his own novel about the frustrations of bureaucracy, the Senegalese director made the decision to make the film in the Wolof language. Sarah Jilani teaches at City, University of London and was chosen as a 2021 New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council which makes research into radio. You can hear her discussing another classic of African cinema on Free Thinking in this episode about Touki Bouki https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0013js4 and Satyajit Ray's Indian Bengali drama Jalsaghar, which depicts a landlord who would prefer to listen to music than deal with his flood ravaged properties https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000v9gjProducer: Torquil MacLeod

In 1821, Thomas de Quincey's Confessions of an Opium Eater paved the way for drug memoirs, but how do contemporary novelists help us see the global opium trade in a different way? Fariha Shaikh's essay looks at the novel An Insular Possession published in 1986 by Timothy Mo, and at Amitav Ghosh's trilogy which began in 2008 with Sea of Poppies. She also quotes from her researches into The Calcutta Review, Fraser's Magazine for Town and Country and the book Tea and Coffee written by the campaigning vegetarian William Alcott as she make links between tea, sugar, opium, addiction and trade. Dr Fariha Shaikh teaches in the Department of English Literature at the University of Birmingham. She is a 2021 New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by the BBC and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to turn research into radio. Producer: Robyn Read

What made him great? Celebrated as a military leader, Alexander took over an empire created by the Persians. Julia Hartley's essay looks at two examples of myth making about Alexander: The Persian Boy, a 1972 historical novel by the English writer Mary Renault and the Shānāmeh or ‘Book of Kings’, an epic written by the medieval Persian poet Abdolghassem Ferdowsi. Julia Hartley lectures at King's College London. She was selected in 2021 as a New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council which turns research into radio. You can hear her in this Free Thinking discussion Dante's Visions https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000zm9b and in another episode about Epic Iran, Lost Cities and Proust https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000xlzh Producer: Torquil MacLeod

Sculptures like mouldy fruit, sea creatures that look like oil, blocks of ice carved from a melting glacier and transported to a gallery, reforesting a disused quarry: Vid Simoniti looks at different examples of environmental art and asks whether they create empathy with nature and inspire behaviour change or do we really need pictures of loft insulation and ground source heat pumps displayed on gallery walls? Vid Simoniti lectures at the University of Liverpool. He hosted a series of podcasts Art Against the World for the Liverpool Biennial 2021. He was selected as a New Generation Thinker in 2021 on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council which turns research into radio. You can hear him taking part in this Free Thinking discussion about Who Needs Critics? https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000w5f3Producer: Luke Mulhall

An 1856 portrait shows a 40-year-old man from Benin who managed to secure his freedom after being captured. Dasalu was taken from Dahomey to Cuba, alongside over five hundred adults and children in the ship Grey Eagle. Once in Havana, he worked for the Count of Fernandina but managed to get a letter to a missionary Charles Gollmer back in Africa. Jake Subryan Richard's essay traces the way one man’s migrations reveal the shifting boundaries of slavery and freedom. Jake Subryan Richards teaches at the London School of Economics and was chosen as a New Generation Thinker in 2021 on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Council, which turns research into radio. You can hear him discussing his research in a Free Thinking episode called Dr Johnson's Circle https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000vq3w and in another episode looking at Ships and History https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001626t Producer: Ruth Watts

The discovery of goffering irons, the tools used to shape ruffs, by an archaeological dig in North America, gives us clues about the way the first English settlers lived. Lauren Working's essay looks at the symbolism of the Elizabethan fashion for ruffs. Now back in fashion on zoom, they were denounced by Puritans, shown off in portraits of explorers like Raleigh and Drake, and seen by the Chesapeake as a symbol of colonisation, whilst the starch was used for porridge at a time of scarcity and war. Lauren Working teaches at the University of York and was chosen in 2021 as a New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council which turns research into radio. You can find another Essay by Lauren called Boy with a Pearl Earring https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0014y52 and hear her in a Free Thinking discussion about The Botanical Past https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000wlgv Producer: Luke Mulhall

Images of Cyril and Methodios adorn libraries, universities, cathedrals and passport pages in Slavonic speaking countries from Bulgaria to Russia, North Macedonia to Ukraine. But the journeys undertaken as religious envoys by these inventors of the Cyrillic alphabet have led to competing claims and political disagreements. Mirela Ivanova's essay considers the complications of basing ideas about nationhood upon medieval history. Mirela Ivanova teaches at the University of Sheffield and was selected as a New Generation Thinker in 2021 on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council, which turns research into radio. You can hear her discussing Sofia's main museum in this episode of Free Thinking https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000wc3p Producer: Luke Mulhall

Comrade or "marra" in north east dialect, and the "dharma" or the way - were put together in a portmanteau word by poet Bill Martin (1925-2010). Poet and New Generation Thinker Jake Morris-Campbell reflects on this idea of Marradharma and what it offers to future generations growing up in the post-Brexit and post-industrial landscape of the north east. In his essay, Jake remembers the pilgrimage he made in 2016 carrying Bill Martin's ashes in a ram's horn from Sunderland (Martin was born in a nearby pit village) to Durham Cathedral. Jake Morris-Campbell teaches at Newcastle University and was selected as a New Generation Thinker in 2021 on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council. You can find him discussing ideas about darkness in a Free Thinking discussion recorded at Sage Gateshead as part of Radio 3's After Dark festival, and looking at mining, coal and DH Lawrence https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000xmjy Producer: Torquil MacLeod

"Delight in disorder" was celebrated in a poem by Robert Herrick (1591-1674) and the long hair, flamboyant dress and embrace of earrings that made up Cavalier style has continued to exert influence as a gender fluid look. Lauren Working's essay considers examples ranging from Van Dyck portraits and plays by Aphra Behn to the advertising for the exhibition called Fashioning Masculinities which runs at the Victoria and Albert museum this spring. Fashioning Masculinities: The Art of Menswear is at the V&A from March 19th 2022. Radio 3 broadcast a series of Essays from New Generation Thinkers exploring Masculinities which you can find on BBC Sounds https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00061jm Lauren Working is a Lecturer in Early Modern Literature at the University of York and a New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to turn academic research into radio. You can hear her discussing The Botanical Past in a Free Thinking discussion https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000wlgv Producer: Luke MulhallImage: Anthony van Dyck Lord John Stuart and his Brother, Lord Bernard Stuart (about 1638) Oil on canvas The National Gallery, London. Bought, 1988 © The National Gallery, London.

From school to work to the military – uniforms can signal authority and belonging. But what happens when uniforms are worn by those whom institutions normally exclude? Or when they’re used out of context? New Generation Thinker Tom Smith explores playful, creative and queer uses of uniforms, from the cult film Mädchen in Uniform, recently released in the UK by the BFI, to documents he discovered in German archives, to his take on the styles embraced in subcultures today.Producer: Ruth Watts Tom Smith is a Senior Lecturer at the University of St Andrews. You can find other Essays by him for Radio 3 exploring Berlin, Detroit, Race and Techno Music https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000kfjt and Masculinities: Comrades in Arms https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00061m5 and hear him in this Free Thinking episode debating New angles on post-war Germany and Austria https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0006sjxImage: Joanna Lumley as Patsy (Left) and Jennifer Saunders as Edina (Right) wearing school uniform in BBC 1 Absolutely Fabulous, 1992.

Fashion from the 1990s to the 1790s and back again: Jade Halbert traces the history of Droopy & Browns, a fashion business renowned for the flamboyant and elegant work of its designer, Angela Holmes. While many British designers of the late twentieth century looked to replicate a lean, monochromatic, almost corporate New York sensibility, Angela Holmes gloried in drama and historicism. A favourite of actresses, artists, writers, and stylish women everywhere, the closure of the business soon after Angela’s death, aged 50, in 2000 marked the end of an era in British fashion. Producer: Jessica Treen Jade Halbert lectures at the University of Huddersfield and is a BBC/AHRC New Generation Thinker on the scheme which turns academic research into radio. You can find another Essay called Not Quite Jean Muir about learning to make a dress on BBC Sounds https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000kgwq and a short Radio 3 Sunday feature on the state of high street fashion shopping https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000gvpnImage: Jade Halbert

Oscar Wilde's famous line from The Importance of Being Earnest focuses on what we might not expect to find - Shahidha Bari's essay considers the range of objects we do carry around with us and why bags have been important throughout history: from designs drawn up in 1497 by Leonardo to the symbolism of Mary Poppins' carpet bag in PL Travers' novel to the luggage carried by refugees travelling across continents often in what's called a Ghana Must Go bag. Producer: Ruth Watts Shahidha Bari is a writer, critic, Professor of Fashion Cultures and Histories at London College of Fashion and presenter of Free Thinking. She was one of the first New Generation Thinkers on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to select ten academics each year to share their research on the radio. You can find a playlist featuring essays, discussions and features by New Generation Thinkers on the Free Thinking website and a whole host of programmes presented by Shahidha. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0144txnImage: Artist Yayoi Kusuma at a Louis Vuitton fashion shoot

"My lady's corselet" was developed by a pioneer of free verse on the frontlines of feminism, the poet Mina Loy. Celebrated in the 1910s as the quintessential New Woman, her love of freedom was shadowed by a darker quest to perfect the female body, as her unusual designs for a figure-correcting corset show. Sophie Oliver asks how she fits into a history of body-correcting garments and cosmetic surgery, feminism and fashion. Working on both sides of the Atlantic writing poetry and designing bonkers body-altering garments: like a bracelet for office workers with a built-in ink blotter, or her ‘corselet’ to correct curvature of the spine in women - in the end Mina Loy couldn’t stop time, and her late-life poetry is full of old clothes and outcast people from the Bowery, as she reckons with – and celebrates – the fact that she has become unfashionable. Producer: Torquil MacLeodImage: Mina Loy, Designs for a ‘corselet’, or ‘armour for the body’, c.1941. Mina Loy papers, Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Courtesy of Roger L. Conover, Mina Loy's editor and executor.Sophie Oliver teaches English Literature at the University of Liverpool and is a New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council which turns academic research into radio programmes. You can find a collection of essays, discussions and features with New Generation Thinkers on the Free Thinking programme website under the playlist Ten Years of New Generation Thinkers https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p08zhs35

Five Irish writers each take a passage from James Joyce’s Ulysses and, through a close reading, explore its meaning and significance within the wider work, as well as what it means to them. Reading Ulysses is a famously challenging experience for most readers, so can our Essayists help?In the final essay of the series, novelist Nuala O'Connor chooses the last episode of the book - Penelope - which is the one Nuala discovered first. In Penelope, we hear Molly Bloom, the wife of the novel's main protagonist, speak to us. In the extract Nuala selects, Molly lies in bed, top to tail with her husband. We hear Molly consider him and his antics - and muse on what husbands, and men in general, mean to her. Nuala examines some of her favourite phrases from the passage; she reveals some of the parallels she can see in Joyce's own biography; and she tells us why the novel's final words might prove the ultimate key to unlocking the book.First broadcast in February 2022 to mark 100 years since the publication of Ulysses.Presenter: Nuala O'Connor Producer: Camellia Sinclair